Fernando Alonso: Sprint weekend 'not ideal' for Aston Martin's car upgrades

According to Fernando Alonso, the Austrian Grand Prix may not provide the ideal conditions for Aston Martin to fully optimise its recent upgrades.

Aston Martin introduced more aggressive sidepod bodywork and a revised floor design for its AMR23 during the Canadian GP, which helped Alonso secure his sixth podium finish of the season, finishing second to Max Verstappen.

However, Alonso believes that Aston Martin's efforts to completely understand the effects of their updates may be hindered by the upcoming Austrian GP, which will be the second sprint round of the season following Azerbaijan.

The new format includes a qualifying session on Friday to determine the grid for the main race, while the sprint event itself consists of a qualifying shootout and a race on Saturday.

With only one free practice session available on Friday afternoon, teams have limited time to fine-tune their setups and validate any car upgrades.

Alonso anticipates that this compressed timetable will make it challenging for Aston Martin to fully exploit the potential of their latest improvements.

"I think the sprint weekend will not be ideal for us," said Alonso.

"We still [need] more time maybe of free practice with our new upgraded car. We still need to understand and optimise the package a little bit.

"In Austria, obviously with the sprint, we will have only FP1 to do that.

"The circuit will be good and maybe better for the package as well... so maybe Austria we have a little bit more pace."